Madness Of The Heart
by ironyofalostkeyword
Summary: Sora hasn't seen his two best friends in over two years. Now Kairi has inherited an old mansion in northern Italy and the three of them meet once again.


A/N

hej, there. I deleted all of my old stuff because it was just plain out embarrassing. Anyway, I kind of wrote something new and quite different (And I improved my English, at least I hope I did).

Actually, I'd have been better if I'd been allowed to name three main characters because Sora, Kairi and Riku are all important in this one.

And since everyone puts some sort of warning in here, I'll do it, too. I'm of age and I'm the one who's writing this, so I guess I should put a M-rating on it. My mind isn't the purest thing in the word and I do use quite a few 'bad' words. Also, there will be gay pairings and not-gay pairings and I don't really know where this is taking.

Sora, Kairi and Riku are all based on real persons and also the places and the scenery, including my car do exist. That also means, no keyblades, no magic, no miracles beyond what's possible in this universe (which can be pretty amazing, after all)

Anyway, here it comes:

* * *

Madness Of The Heart

* * *

I. Butterflies In Hibernation.

Tiny particles of dust are dancing in the pale rays of early sunshine that is falling through huge windows. The glass seems like thin slices of frozen fog and it's got to be a little eternity since they were cleaned. The wooden frames certainly have seen better times. I find myself wondering if there are butterflies hibernating in the cracks in the old wood. When I was really small my Dad told me butterflies hibernate in cracks in old wood. I'm not sure if he just didn't want to tell me that they just die after one summer, tough. Actually I still have no idea about the life span of a butterfly but I'm pretty sure they just die. What would you do if you only had one short summer to live? If you'd just die with the arrival of the cold days? I suppose I wouldn't change anything. I close my eyes and stare against the red and purple of my closed eyelids. _It's weird, _I think, _If I really only had this one summer left... I wouldn't change anything. _It's pretty unlikely that I'll die in a couple of month, though. I'm a naturally healthy person. I just happen to have sore muscles in my thighs because my stamina sucks and I had this great idea to go running yesterday. I just felt like it and the weather was great and I really missed running but I absolutely hate having sore muscles. Plus I'm a whiny bitch, even though, I don't like being one. Fortunately, right now they don't hurt – because I haven't moved an inch in the last three hours. I'm lying on my back on the cold marble floor of a huge library. I'm the only living creature in here – if there really aren't any hibernating butterflies, that is. Wait - it doesn't make sense at all if there are... because it is summer after all – why would butterflies hibernate during summer?

The bookshelves in this room are organized in a weird heptagonal star-like shape and in the middle of the room there's a huge star with seven points on the ground. It's made of what seems to be some sort black stone – probably onyx or something since I've never heard of black marble. The rest of the floor is just the 'normal' kind of somewhat grey-ish marble. I'm lying in the very center of said star. My shoulder blades and pelvic bones are making this position slightly uncomfortable but I can't help but like the slight pain. It feels like I'm connected to the stone, cut out of time and space, a creature so old that time is just a negligibility. The seven pointed star is my anchor to the universe.

I'm only wearing a thin black t-shirt and black shorts and I can feel goose bumps rise all over my skin. I don't intend to leave my little world yet. After all I'm trying to figure out the 'why'.

Why am I here after all this time?

Why don't they seem to be happy when they're clearly supposed to be?

Why am I still caring?

Why am I hiding now that I'm finally here?

I was really surprised when I got her postcard several weeks ago and she invited me to stay with them at her aunt's house, or should I say villa. And I'm still surprised by myself that I actually took a toothbrush and the clothes I could fit into my backpack and drove all the way down here. 750 miles into the south. I crossed the Alps and if I'd stand up and try to look out of those milky windows I could probably catch a glimpse of the dark blue water that is Lake Garda. It's my first time in the north of Italy, I've only been to Sicily with my art class back in high school. Thinking of that trip feels like I'm remembering someone else's memories.

Her aunt had died and she were to inherit this estate – that's how they got here in the first place and they invited me to come, too. She did actually. It's been more than two years since I've last seen them. I spent my last two years travelling the world and improving my English and Japanese... while she continued her visual motion design studies and he transferred from one university to another, changed from one subject to another. Sometimes I think he wants to be unhappy. I don't want him to and that's been the reason for more arguments and not-talking-to-each-other-episodes than I can count. I could have visited them. I guess I should feel bad that I didn't but I don't. There's very little that I've ever regretted and sadly not visiting my two best friends when I had the chance doesn't have a place on the list of my regrets in life. I can clearly remember the surprised look on her face when she opened the door a couple of days ago. She'd probably expected a huge grin on a tanned face, an unruly mob of brown hair gracing my head. I still have that hair, though. And I guess I could easily pull off that grin. But I've gotten really pale lately, even though I'm certainly not avoiding the sun. I just am. I'm a lot thinner, too. I haven't had the best appetite lately and now I look like 17-year-old that has grown far to fast. _I'm here._ I said. And she jumped to link her arms around my neck and cried. Why are girls always crying? I mean, she's clearly happy, why's she crying? I didn't get it. I'm not getting it now either... but I guess I'm willing to accept my own stupidity since I'm too lazy to actually do some research on such a question. I'd rather know if butterflies really hibernate.

He didn't say anything when I walked into the kitchen. He stood up and gave me an awkward one armed hug and I said again _I'm here._ I couldn't see even the faintest smile on his face. I pretty sure it's not that he doesn't want me here – the two of us fighting over her is a chapter of a long finished episode of almost 5 years ago. It took me a while but I don't see her like that anymore. It doesn't even hurt to look at them being all lovey-dovey. They never really were all that physical around me and I'm pretty sure they never were that physical at all. I don't see more in her than my best friend. I don't feel the urge to touch her or kiss her anymore.

I'm always amazed how they could end up together. They're like siblings sometimes. And then they're like a grandfather and his granddaughter. They're so much alike at times that I believe them to be clones and then he's suddenly acting like he's a hundred years old and she like she's five. Actually She's 24 and he's 23. I'm 22 by the way. I'm the youngest here. He sorts clothespin by color and she wears colorful kid's clothes. She's tiny, so she can easily buy her clothes at the children's section. She says she doesn't like it when she thinks 'impure' thoughts and I find myself wondering how I ever thought we could possibly match. My mind is pretty perverted and I don't see where that could be a problem. I'm rather enjoying my train of thought usually.

Somewhere someone closes a door. Somewhere the wind is playing in the leaves of the huge trees down in the yard. Somewhere a dog barks. Northern Italy slowly awakes. The pale sun's been up for at least an hour and I'm sure it'll be really hot outside once it's completely up.

The world around me is alive and I'm struggling to not lose my mental connection to the creature of stone and space and time. To the seven pointed universe of black stone.

Another door is opening and this time I'm sure it's the double wing door of the library. I frown. I don't want the serenity of my solitude to be interrupted. I close my eyes once again, _when did they open and what did they see?_, calm my breathing and let the frown fall from my face. I'm really good at pretending. Pretending to care, pretending to be nice, pretending to be naïve, pretending to be asleep.

I recognize his footsteps. Bare feet on marble. The quiet rustling of too long jeans, the faint tinkle of his moon pendant against the star pendant around his neck. The moon pendant was a present from his dad... a long time ago. I don't know him without it. I remember the sharp pain in my chest when I first noticed that the moon pendant was gone and instead her tiny bell had appeared there. But now it's the moon pendant again. The star pendant was a birthday present I gave him for his 22nd birthday. I didn't think he'd actually wear it but in the few picture I've seen of them during the last two years he was always wearing it. I'm surprised because it was actually a last minute present. I didn't spent much thought on it.

His footsteps have almost reached me and I'm trying to ban all thoughts from my mind... and fail.

He doesn't try to 'wake' me – which wouldn't be necessary either since I'm already wide awake. I can hear him squatting down beside me. He's watching me again. I don't know if I should think that's creepy but fact is it doesn't feel creepy at all. He sighs. I wonder what's going on in his mind. Actually I can't remember a time where I wasn't wondering about just that. I never know how to react to him. I can always guess how he's going to react in certain situations but I never know how he reacts towards people. Towards her, towards me. I imagine I can fell his radiating sadness like a thin blue-ish mist around him. I can't but I like to pretend.

Maybe he's a hibernating butterfly.

If I'm the stone star and he's the hibernating butterfly, then who is she? Maybe she's a little fairy. Tiny and delicate, a fragile creature everyone wants to protect, obsessed with shiny things. A candy thief you can't hold a grudge against. These thoughts make me smile inwardly and I'm careful not to let it show on my face since he's still watching me; But me being the most unchanging of us three, that's just pure irony. I'm like quicksilver, I feel uneasy if I stay at the same place for too long while she is the most down-to-earth person out of us three. But maybe those pictures don't refer to our personalities but to our minds. Is there even a difference? Ah, I don't care. I bet there is. I always do what I want. I'm slowly approaching the stars and I'm confident I'll get my goal. She's never certain of what she really wants. She's always doubting herself. In a way even more than my not-so-secretive watcher is. The sleeper. The dreamer. Yeah, I guess he really is a hibernating butterfly. A butterfly that didn't notice it's summer already. It keeps dreaming of a better world and forgets to be alive while it can. A fierce sadness shoots through my chest. I'm not sure if I let my facade slip just now. If he's starting to figure out that I'm only pretending.

I wish he'd go away. I don't want to leave this spot.

I'm pretty sure he won't leave until I 'wake up', though. He can be rather patient. And it's not like I didn't notice him watching me during the last few days. He still has to say a single word to me. I still haven't heard his voice in over two years. I'm waiting. I can be rather patient, too.

I open my eyes.

There's an almost invisible movement in his brows. So transient that I'm not sure it's been there for a moment. It has, though. Which means I caught him off-guard. I'm a little surprised that he's surprised – after so many morning of waking up next to each other he should know that I don't have an 'awakening-phase'. I'm wide awake in an instant. One second I'm sleeping so tight that people think I'm dead and the other I'm up and looking for my shirt. It's always been like that. It really took me some time and practice to put up an convincing act in slow and confused early morning scenes. Because especially after a night of good sex my system is overflowing with pure energy. It's a bit how I imagine it must be to be on drugs. I crave that feeling every single moment I'm not feeling it and the burst of energy feels like there's light and color lashing out of my back, making me jump and dance and fly. It's a completely irrational happiness. Sometimes lasting only a fracture of a second, sometimes I'm like that for the whole day. On those days I don't do a single normal step. Everything is dancing, bouncing around. I'm doing the most retarded things then, I'm like an ADHS-child that refused to take its Ritalin. I'm loud and obnoxious, I'm singing, I call friends I haven't seen in years, I paint all the walls and I fix everything I can find. I buy flowers and give them to a stranger on the streets and I dance for hours just for myself. I don't even need any music. It's all in my head. She loves me most when I'm like that. But it's become rather rare. Sex is always a good trigger but I didn't have that much sex lately. Mostly because I'm pretty much unable to keep a steady relationship and/or because I really don't want to have one. I want the fun and the action but I can't look at their love-struck faces and I have no intention to hold their hands. I'm not even into kissing if it's just for the sake of kissing and doesn't lead to something more.

Most of the days I don't have that electricity flowing through my veins. Usually it's just blood. And then I need my tunes and melodies, my music to keep me from just lying somewhere and doing nothing for days. I want to do exactly that. Sit somewhere and not thinking anything. Because I can. I can sit there and my mind goes completely blank to the point that I don't know what my eyes are seeing, even though they're wide open. That's why I hide under my huge headphones on such days, why I don't talk and why I hide my face under the hood of my jacket.

She hates it when I'm like that. She hugs me from behind and presses her face into my back and breathes warm air into my spine right between my shoulder blades. I'm not that tall myself, but she's just that short. On really bad days that doesn't draw out any reaction at all, on slightly better days I touch her small and warm hands which are linked where she believes my heart to be. Her knuckles are white because she's so tense and trying so hard to make me alive again.

Those bad days clearly outnumber the good days but I'm trying and I've been able to get some 'normal' days lately, too. Maybe I really am growing up after all.

He's staring straight into my face and I'm staring right back. I know I'm always the one to win these staring contests and he knows that, too. I wonder what he's thinking, what he's seeing when he stares into my eyes like he's trying to decipher the code that is my soul. Ha. It's not like he has a Rosetta Stone or something. I don't know how to decipher that code so why would he be able to do so? I wonder if he's still trying to figure out where the real connection between her and me is. Why we can communicate with just a glance and flicking of fingers. Actually, it should be obvious since he and I can communicate that way, too. I'm pretty sure this way of communication doesn't work between the two of them, which is hilarious and sad at the same time. How did they end up together? Why? Which piece of the puzzle am I missing? because there has to be something. They've been living together for over four years. I can't tell if they're a couple in common understanding. At some point they really were – but now? I haven't seen them touch in any way since I'm here and I know they won't hide it around me. Or maybe they would. Which would be a funny change of things. Sometimes I really wonder what's going on in their heads. Their minds are just as twisted as mine and it's always an adventure to explore their ways of thinking. As I continue to stare right into his eyes I think, _You there, are you thinking exactly the same as I am?_ It's possible after all. It'd be kind of amusing if he really were. If he'd be trying to figure out what's going on in my head; Would he be able to guess that I see him as an hibernating butterfly? And myself as a creature of stone? The stone is quickly fading from my limps and I can feel the color and the life returning. I'm feeling more and more alive and I'm getting somewhat excited. _You and I, we could have great sex right here, right now,_ I think. We never had sex and I'm not sure if it even would work out because he can be impossibly prude. But having sex is always a better option than masturbation and, well, I think masturbation is a pretty convenient thing. In the morning makes your system wake up and, since I have a really low blood pressure, it's always good to start into a new day. And in the evening it makes you tired enough to fall asleep, which can be quite a problem without being tired. And I only feel tired after I had a nice orgasm and went to bed right away. If I get going right afterwards I won't feel tired for the whole day. So to me, I think, masturbation is one of humankind's greatest features. I'm pretty sure he won't have sex with me right now. It's a shame, really. And I don't think I can take responsibility for a brain burned down to its ashes this early in the morning. I could always just do it myself. I wouldn't mind him watching me come but I'm pretty sure I'd destroy his last believes in the world. So no good-morning-orgasm for me. Too bad.

I'm pretty sure if he knew what I'm thinking he'd be glad that he doesn't know what I'm thinking. Oh, wait that doesn't make sense. Anyway. I'm going to stare into his face for a bit longer and imagine what could be and isn't. Usually I don't bother thinking the should-, would- and could-thoughts but right now it's fun.

His eyes shift and he sighs and the spell is broken. Maybe he'll start talking now. I'm sure his voice didn't change the slightest during the last two year. His appearance really didn't. He still looks like my favourite emo-boy. Frown and black-framed glasses in place, black, long sleeved shirt, black jeans, bare feet. The bare feet are a new one. Maybe he ran out of socks or now he really doesn't own one single sock without holes anymore. That's why I'm not wearing socks anyway. Because I don't have any. I don't even go shopping for clothes that infrequently, I just always forget to buy socks. He's watching those huge dirty windows now. Did he notice the cracks and does he think of the butterflies?

I stand up and turn to him. "Are you coming?" I ask. His eye flick into my direction and it's like he notices my presence for the first time. And he thinks I'm weird. Right. I'm walking towards the exit of the library, always close enough to the shelves to be able to drag my fingers over the backs of the books. I'm dispersing dust that dances in the sun rays. This library feels more like a cathedral than like a library. I'm more or less an atheist but I really love cathedrals. In there it feels like time has stopped. The light that falls through huge colorful windows, the silent gleaming of the organ pipes, the jitter of the candlelight at the tables where people light candles to pray for something. I know my mom sometimes comes to the catholic cathedral in my home town and lights some candles. She's not even a catholic, she just likes that idea of lightning a candle for someone. It's really nice, even I did it a few times and no one really minds if there are people who believe in something different or in nothing at all.

He has caught up to me and now I can hear his rustling steps right behind me. How can he be so loud when he's only walking? I barely hear my own steps with him here and usually my steps feel like a sudden thunderstorm in the quiet tranquillity of my surrounding. I've reached the doors and I hesitate for a moment and wonder if I'd be able to open those large old door without a noise. They squeak terribly and I flinch. Suddenly his hand is on my shoulder and and he turns me around in one fluent movement. Or did I turn myself, unconsciously waiting for him to touch me? His face is mere inches away and I can see his eyes widen slightly. In a movie this would be the point where two old friends finally greet each other, or where he kisses me and I get my sex on the library floor or whatever. This is no movie, though. And I just ask "What is it?" and he shrugs and I turn around and we leave the heaven of solitude and dreams. _Idiot, _I think,_ This would've been a great moment to at lest say "nothing", just to say anything at all._ I'm in a bad mood all of a sudden. I want to hit something, I'm regretting that I've ever come here, I want to drown his fucking blank face in the lake. I want to kick her and watch her blood spilling on the floors just to make her shut up. I don't fucking want to hear her fake-cute voice anymore, I want to burn down this house and I want to laugh at their dying faces screaming in disbelief. Fuck you, guys. On the verge of a painful death, would you stop treating me like a wounded animal, would you say my name once? Would you fucking call my name? The handle of the door I'm about to open is shaped like a lizard. It catches my attention and the sudden flash of uncontrollable anger is gone with the wind. It's just lasted for the maybe twenty-five steps through the hallway, from the double wing door of the library to the lizard door handle of this one.

Over the time I've become quite good at controlling those sudden anger flashes. Usually no one even notices that I'm burning with hate and destructiveness. And it's gone as fast at it comes. I'm careful not to act out on those because I'd be a disaster. I'm good at hurting people, I'm good at destroying things, dreams and hopes. Somewhere in the code of my soul is a dark little sequence that causes the vengeful little animal in my chest to awake and breath out its hatred like hot dark ash and boiling lava.

I open the door and the first thing I notice is her dress. What_ is _this?

* * *

A/N

I'm sorry to end it just like this but I really didn't found a better place to split this.

Go listen to "If I ever feel better" by Phoenix.

Oh, and don't by to shy to tell me what you think.


End file.
